Favorite Schools

Favorite Teams

Greater New Orleans

Change Region

comments

Obama administration drops plan to open shelters for Central American children

Immigration Overload Refugee Status

FILE - This June 25, 2014 file photo shows a group of immigrants from Honduras and El Salvador who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally as they are stopped in Granjeno, Texas. A White House proposal to grant some young Honduran citizens refugee status before they try to head to the United States illegally could provide a much needed safety valve to alleviate some of the stress on government agencies responsible for dealing with the flood of children and families from Central America crossing the border in recent months, immigration experts said. In recent weeks, the flow across the border has slowed. (AP Photo/Eric Gay) ORG XMIT: WX104

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has abandoned plans to open dozens of temporary shelters for unaccompanied children who crossed the U.S. border from Central America.

Fort Polk Army Base near Leesville, Barksdale Air Force Base in Bossier City, Hirsch Coliseum in Shreveport and Belle Chasse Naval Air Station in New Orleans were all approached by the Department of Health and Human Services about taking in groups of unaccompanied immigrant children, according to Sen. David Vitter, R-La. Officials with all four facilities expressed opposition to taking in the children, according to Vitter's office.

But in a memo, first disclosed by Syracuse.com/The Post Standard, federal officials said the temporary shelters are no longer needed.

"The number of children apprehended in Customs and Border Protection Custody has fallen, while the number of children HHS is releasing to appropriate sponsors as their immigration cases proceed has increased," said the memo.

It's not clear whether the decline in Central American children crossing the border is related to statements by President Barack Obama and other U.S. officials that the children entering the U.S. illegally would most likely be returned to their home countries, or simply because the hot August weather makes the 1,000-mile plus trip even more difficult than during cooler-months.

Martin Gutierrez, Vice president of Community Ministries for Catholic Charities in New Orleans, said that about 1,000 Central American children have arrived in the Metro area, and relatives or family friends are housing almost all of them.

He said most of the children have begun school, but face challenges learning the English language and adjusting to a new culture, while worrying about possible deportation back to their Central American nations. He said many faces a traumatic trip across the border, making the move out of desperation because of gang-related violence in their communities.

"It is stressful for children knowing they could end up being deported back to their original countries," Gutierrez said.

In some areas, deportation hearings have been speeded up for the children. But in New Orleans, where the only immigration judge recently retired, a huge backlog means most news cases aren't being scheduled until 2016, according to immigration lawyers. Temporary judges reassigned temporarily from an Oakdale immigration court are now handling the docket.

House Republicans adopted legislation late Friday that would address the influx of unaccompanied children crossing the U.S. border by sending them home via an expedited process and another bill that would end a two-year-old Obama administration policy of freeing from deportation immigrant children who have lived in the United States since 2007.

But the bill is destined to go nowhere, with the Democratic-led Senate unlikely to even consider it, and President Barack Obama vowing a veto if it somehow made it to his desk. He called the bills "extreme" and "unworkable."

Vitter recently called on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to bring back the Senate from its five-week summer recess to pass the House bill. Reid has called the House bill a non-starter.

Said Vitter: "We have a true crisis at our southern border. Yet Harry Reid is blocking Senate votes on the two bills the House has passed and has put us in recess instead. I call on him to have the Senate vote on those two common-sense, House-passed bills immediately."

Vitter complained Friday that he still isn't getting updated data from the Obama administration about the numbers of Central American children and adults who entered the United States illegally in recent months.